Pursuing a hobby is always an unknown and oblivion act to enhance and develop one’s personality. We indulge in a hobby that represents our personality. People on the softer side choose music, dance or painting as a hobby. People with an adventurous instinct choose wild hobbies like mountaineering, underwater diving and so on. Similarly people enjoying heritage or who like exchanging and networking involve in collectibles.

Sometimes people deliberately choose a hobby to communicate about their likes and dislikes, about their personality and about their choices.

Why should I pursue a hobby?

Stress-buster: For those who engage in busy careers, pursuing hobby becomes important. To vent out their emotions and set aside a space for themselves, people indulge in a hobby. Some such stress busters are cooking, pottery, bird watching, swimming, etc.

Instills a sense of appreciation: When we immerse ourselves in gaining a skill set, it involves practice. With practice, we hone our skills to pursue our favourite hobby more artistically. By involving in ardent practice, we can understand and empathize with another hobbyist and the effort it takes to deliver the same. Though this is a long process, people with a hobby instill in themselves a sense of appreciation.

knowledge enhancement: A hobby cannot always be pursued in solitude. It requires knowledge sharing and team work. When we start advancing and gain acumen pertaining to a hobby, we need more and more relevant information. For this we engage and network with other hobbyists. This allows knowledge enhancement.

Self change happens: Unknowingly as we progress in exploring a hobby, we change with the changing level of skills and obviously changing perception.

Self development: We develop our personality and the aura around us, which changes the world. Though this sounds spiritual and ethereal to hear, a person who has pursued a hobby sincerely for over 5 to 6 years would agree with this aspect of improvement.

Community help: A hobby has its own network and ecosystem due to which it exists among us. This existence helps a community in an indirect way. It provides employment and avocation to people who are unemployed and idle.

Costs you lesser than a penny and gives you a world of fun! Learning a new language has never been a more attractive choice than it is today. With the virtual world shrinking and more and more people associating themselves as global citizens, a trend fuelled by increasing travel, there has been a growing interest and curiosity to learn about more than one’s own culture.

It is a matter of pride to be multi-lingual and is a hot skill these days. It is helping many job seekers to land in a job easily, when combined with other regular skill sets. As learning a new or foreign language is widely touted to increase critical thinking skills, creativity, and flexibility.

But as a hobby too, learning a new language is an interesting proposition. With all the resources available on Internet, it renders itself as a beautiful and enjoyable journey that connects one to new cultures and help in becoming more eligible citizens of this new global society!

Here is a simple and effective plan that helps you get started on this neo-journey,

Decide on what language to learn. Preferably a language you are a little familiar with and want to become fluent, or a totally new foreign language to enjoy the fun of learning something completely novel.

Establish different stages for the whole learning experience – Initially, you may want to learn the language just to be able to understand movies and get a peek into that country’s culture. Later, you may want to be able to speak in that language with your friends or envision building a profession, or you may further want to become a language expert that requires you to read and write as well.

Look up on the internet and try to design a learning program that would help you make use of all the available resources. This may include, enrolling on websites that sends you a daily dose of learning or some animated exercises that lets you learn in an interactive way or finding a native speaker that can spend some time talking to you, be a part of forum where your learning is made more holistic.

When you start making progress with your learning, it is also a great idea to start using what you learn in your day-to-day conversations. This hobby is quite contagious and may soon land you up with some company from your own circle, bringing in that extra bit of fun!

India is an eventful country and that provides umpteen opportunities for teenagers and students to capitalize on their hobbies for pocket money. Some hobbies would fetch more than just pocket money. Those hobbies are listed here for students who are already pursuing them:

Design and Illustration: If you are good at digital design and illustrating ideas into figure forms, you will have loads of options to earn your money. Apart from design houses there are many corporate sector digital needs which could be a right fit for you to work with.

Photography: You can focus and have an eye for detail, photography suits you best. It is good to work under a professional before contracting assignments on your own.

Web designing: This is an extension to digital and graphic designing. Web designing involves programming, developing and designing. To pursue this, you will require a team to handle the scale as you grow.

Writing: There are very few, truly able professional writers who can actually sell a story to their audience. The corporate world has a dearth for good writers and they require people who can speak on behalf of a firm through their writing skills.

Event management: As mentioned in the beginning, in a eventful country like India, events always happen. There are a lot of resources to be gathered, deadlines to be achieved, processes to be monitored to host an event. In the urban areas, event management is a good part time avenue.

Tutoring: School children, hobby learners, skill learners require tutors in their areas of interest. If you are good in a subject matter and at tutoring, this hobby could fetch you a reasonable monthly income.

Cooking: This hobby need not be limited to your kitchen. You could spread the aroma by catering food to small parties and gatherings. This would help build your network and culinary skills.

Music: Like dancers, singers and instrumentalists are required for professional reasons. Singers have opportunities on radio, for advertisements, entertainment reasons and so on. Same is the case with instrumentalists.

Bridal make over: Weddings are on a high in India. Big fat wedding is a popular fad. With the country getting, we can see ostentatious weddings. This trend has provided opportunities for people who have make up as a hobby.

Journalism has gone through a cosmetic surgery over the years, in terms of the skills required by a journalist. A diploma or degree in journalism is not enough for a person to have a strong career as a journalist.

Cooking can get really boring if you look at it as a mundane chore. Yet most of us cannot do without it. There is some good news though. There are hordes of innovative ways to spice up this task. For people pressed for time and cannot afford to spend hours in the kitchen, let us try our hand with a few quick fix strategies to pep it up.

Do some homework, set a menu! And plan your week ahead

Decide on what type of novel recipes you would like to explore in the week – a side dish, or a salad or any dessert! It could be an absolutely new variety of salads you have never tried before or an interesting global cuisine that you came across on a food show or a variety of soup recipes you found on the internet that claim to go easy on your tummies and give your dinners a healthy boost. Just make sure they are absolutely new on your menu. Make a day –wise planner for the entire week. Pick up those recipes that that do not mess up your calorie conscious diet regimes and take less time to prepare. This is to ensure you come back to such fun activities in future.

Stick up the recipes of your choice on your kitchen’s cabinetry or fridge!

This way you have the ready reckoner available and you know what you plan to cook. It

Today’s menu

should also help you shop accordingly. Shop for all the ingredients you need in advance so that you don’t foil this fun assignment half way through.

Get the soup boiling and record the fun experience!

Take a quick look at your note every morning when you enter the kitchen. Look forward to that day’s menu and the episode of fun that comes along. Start cooking and get the fun trip rolling. Take some random pictures all the way long right from when you start shopping till you lay them down on the table. It’s a beautiful experience when you look back once the activity is over. If it enthused you more than your expectations, get people to write some comments on the pictures and stick them up on your cabinetry of refrigerator for a few days. You can even post them on your blog too.

College is a cool playground to implement your start up ideas. This will also be encouraged by the management. To start a business at college you need to identify a niche market, where you can sell a product or service. Once you identify the market, make a list of resources you require. Form a team with your seniors, peers or juniors. You could involve one of your professors as a mentor. Your customers could be students, tutors, management or parents.

IDEA 1: Stationery store – Start a stationery store at subsidized rates for colleges. Your college could be your first customer. Colleges require basic stationery items like pens, markers, chalk, notepads, papers and so on. Apart from that some electronic items like headphones, mouse, usb sticks could be added to your product catalogue for sale.

IDEA 2: Virtual learning – Colleges are hubs for learning. To develop a ecosystem to educate each other is always a challenge. Create a virtual learning support system for your college and involve other colleges eventually. Manage your college community and engage with other colleges to build an interactive and supportive ecosystem.

IDEA 3: Personal tutoring – Few students at college require personal attention which not be possible in a classroom. Professors and lecturers may not be accessible all the time for students. If you are good at a subject you can capitalize this opportunity. If you are a smart kid, help your peers and tutor them one-on-one. You could charge a nominal fee for spending your time with focused attention on the student.

IDEA 4: Sports education – Though college is centered on academic learning, sports will definitely be a part of the curriculum. Cricket, hockey, basketball or any other sport that rules your college could be a great source of income. Conduct innovative games and introduce new game methodologies for students to enjoy sports and apply them during tournaments. Coach your juniors and peers in college sports. Bring in seniors as sport mentors.

IDEA 5: Notes on my back: T-shirts are a common wear among youth. T-shirts with academic notes could be your unique selling proposition (USP). This will inculcate easy learning among students. Your t-shirt will have a new piece of information for your friends to learn and you will have other t-shirts to learn from. This could be a good learning methodology. You can sell to other colleges by customizing their logo on it.

You can’t stop yourself from penning down or typing your thoughts as soon as they hit your mind. If you have this syndrome, then you could channelize your symptoms to become a writer!

Writers adopt their own style after few years of practice. They feel comfortable within a segment that matches their writing style.

Different writing styles

Reporting: Most journalists working in the current affairs segment use this style of writing. Here, one needs to witness or investigate a case. Then analyse it and report it to the readers. Personal opinions are avoided in this style. This is used to report an incident to a group of people. Business writers also use this style.

Descriptive: Authors, fiction writers, whitepaper, film directors presenters use a descriptive style. They provide a detailed picture through their words. They communicate every detail, hence scripts with a descriptive style are lengthy.

Creative: Creative style is the bestselling style. Story writers, marketeers and fiction writers adopt a creative style to sell their words. However, not everyone can be successful creative writers. Write-ups with a creative style are meant to captivate the readers. This skill is a gift of the rare.

Narrative: This is close to reporting style. A narrative style is adopted to communicate about incidents, stories, conflicts, happenings and so on.

Expository: Expository writing style is useful when the author wants to stick to a specific subject matter and elaborate on it for its audience. Here again the writers avoids opinions and personal feelings about the subject matter. He furnishes the article with more facts pertaining to the subject matter.

Persuasive:Persuasive writing is completely opposite to expository. This style is mainly adopted to convince the readers about the author’s viewpoint. This style may get very influential at times. Most marketeers, politicians, business men and celebrities use this style to communicate their thoughts and influence their fans or readers.

Pets are great stress busters! It is a well known fact. Equally true is the fact that plants do the same and often much more. In today’s fast paced life with limited leisure, it is very vital to make those few hours you spend at home a quality deal!

Let us take a quick look at how cultivating a small garden in your home helps you refine your limited living space.

House plants clean and purify the air in the house. Every little aspect helps given the growing pollution levels in metro cities these days.

A little greenery in and around the house boosts your spirit or soothes your worked out nerves after a long day’s work.

Houseplants generally come in different shades of colors and most of them are flowering plants. They decorate your house with vibrant shades from god’s very own palette.

Start it simple! Make use of old plastic mugs or containers that allow plants to breathe a bit. Place them where they receive ample amount of sunlight. Window sills or balconies are ideal spots. If space is unusually limited, you could create wire hangings from roofs or rails around. Choose herbs to kick start the hobby. Coriander, Mint, Spring Onions, Salad Greens, Tulsi are easy to grow.

Depending on the type of plants you choose, over time you may even get to revel in the luxury of a meal made from your own kitchen grown vegetables and herbs. Imagine whiffing that fresh scent of mint in the morning!

You get perked up when you get to feel your first fruit of the effort. A cup of fresh mint or tulsi tea from your garden or dressing your curries with a bunch of freshly cut coriander from your own little plants grown with so much of love and attention.

The beauty of this hobby is that the efforts are not only yours. God contributes to it in a great way too. Your little plants do their bit in making your life a little more enjoyable.

Music got twisted with the discovery of ROCK and got tangled with Linkin Park. People just loved Linkin Park from the day they hit the stereo with Hybrid Theory, selling about 4.8 million copies. Their success meter stretched a scale with their next work ‘Meteora‘. Linkin Park got social in promoting a couple of songs from their album, ‘A Thousand Suns‘ on MySpace.

Who is Linkin Park?

With all the success and spotlight they tasted, it is hard for them to come to India. Though Linkin Park claims to have a fanbase in India, it is tough time to convince sponsors who can host Linkin Park for Indian audience. Linkin Par have come up with an online petition as a solution for this problem. Read more about the petition here – http://www.linkinparkindia.com/p/linkin-park-in-india.html